Map Shanty

I read a number of different blogs and saw the following maps circulating around a few. Some interesting food for thought.

This post, from 'Alas, a Blog' overlays an isopleth map of the high seas of the Cretaceous period, with a dot-distribution map of cotton production in 1860, with a choropleth (colored units of land) map of presidential election results from 2008. It makes an argument about how social and economic forces and ancient geologic shifts conflate to influence present-day realities.... which kind of smacks of environmental determinism to me, but might be potentially useful/educational? What is the purpose of the blogger in making this comparison?

It's also interesting to consider the use of colors on election results/polling maps. This website offers some useful critique and questions about the symbology used in election mapping:

The problem with choropleth (or value-by-area) maps to depict information related to people is that they visually emphasize the land (e.g., an enumeration unit such as a state), and not the people living on the land (i.e., the voters).

This is a point I think it would be worth our effort to belabor in the programming for our shanty - ultimately mapping/cartography is a system of representation that has its origins in colonialism. It is a system of representation that necessarily generalizes, and thus, is dangerous. Maps are about people, but not necessarily or even often the people living on the land, as is commonly assumed. More often they reveal the predilection of the mapmakers themselves, and the cultural and political context in which they were made. As 'radical mappers' we must make extended efforts to challenge these histories in our mapmaking and educating.